Bridgewater, Hillsborough, or Greenbrook?

[brookerboy]

Igb6
I'm sorry you are not happy with the southside of Green Brook. You sound like the type of person that should be on the northside of town. The homes are newer and usually larger up their.
Every time your child has to go somewhere you have to get in a car and the neighborhoods aren't as friendly. Keep saving and you might be able to get out of Renda Pl.

[njhomesearch]

Hello,

We are looking to purchase a home in Branchburg. Can anyone tell us what they think about the commute to the city is

Can anyone give us an opion on the school system?

We were looking in four different areas Bridgewater, Hillsboro, Branchburg and princeton Junction.

We felt the houses were older in Princeton Junction. Hillsboro had newer homes but we are not sure about the commute to the city since there is no train station in the area. can anyone give us there opinion on the commute from hillsboro to nyc and Edison.

Branchburg seems like it has newer homes we want to know if the commute will be easy? We actually like newer and large homes.

[ADDBrophy]

Well I just read this entire post from start to finish and was frothing at the mouth to do my own reply so here goes. First off, Green Brook is a nice town that has a bowling alley, a White Castle, the very friendly Sunset Diner, a Perkins where the apple pie is tops, Just Subs 2 which will def never disappoint in it's quality, a porn shop that nobody ever goes too and I don't know how the heck they stay in business, a trashy welfare motel filled with drugs and annoying crack addicts who go to the White Castle in the midnight hours and creep you out, a massage parlor where happy endings are the norm, Branch Brook pool store for all your swimming needs, Pizza Brothers which makes a good pie, Shake A Paw where the service is better than your big-box Petco, a closed former strip club that is nice to look at with it's blue color but for some reason hasn't been bought (it could easily be a Sayreville/Seaside style dance club), lots of car dealerships (tip: if you want free popcorn and soda as scummy as it sounds go to the Saturn dealership and pretend your with somebody who actually has an appt. or is buying there haha), a beautiful park in the mountains where if your lucky you can see New York City in the distance, and is more blue-collar feeling than B-Water or H-Borough despite the nice places in the mountains. I miss the Friendly's there btw (speaking of which, Medimerge is also in the town). Want a good hot dog? Go to Texas Weiner 2. Outback Steakhouse might provide you with some good blooming onions if you've got the cash. Green Brook police are CRAZY EFFICIENT when it comes to pulling over people, especially drunk drivers in the midnight hours, and you don't really want to speed in the area because they will be out there! If you want to see a rather bizzare shopping center, go to the one where the bonefish grill is and you will find strangely colored stores that sell cowboy boots and wedding dresses. Overall, as long as you don't live next door to the welfare motel you should be good. And to the person who wrote about undesirables from Plainfield, that is completely untrue and if anything has more to do with Scotch Plains and Fanwood/N. Plainfield than Green Brook.

[ADDBrophy]

Bridgewater would be the place that I would choose out of the three. I don't know why people are dissing the Bradley Gardens/Fiderene area of town I mean sure it has a more blue collar feel to it than the other parts but I wouldn't consider it bad. Bridgewater/Raritan HS is huge and I agree it defiantly has less of a snobbish aura than Watchung Hills Regional where poop doesn't seem to stink if your platinum blonde or have spikey black hair (haha I'm kind of being sarcastic there are just as many nice people in that WH as snotty it's just the snotty stick out more and I know not all platinum blondes and spikey black haired dudes are mean or vapid). Bridgewater/Raritan does however also have a bit of a snot factor and God I hope your wearing Ed Hardy or Affliction because that's how it rolls there. Bridgewater mall is one of the most boring malls in New Jersey and weak in the food department (it says alot when a mall doesn't even have a Cinnabon or some sort of ice cream place, which it once did but got taken out unfortunately). The movie theater there is not as nice as Reading Cinema's in Manville, so if you see a flick you'll probably end up there instead. You have Target/Costco/Toys and Babies R Us (I know Toys R Us is in Raritan but that whole Somerville Circle area is just as much B-Water IMHO) Applebees/TGI/Borders and Barnes and Noble/Rita's Italian Ice which has better service in the B-water location than most others in the area/Wegmans (Best supermarket period)/Home Depot/IHOP/Chicken Holiday (Def the most underrated fast food chain in the Northeast)/your usual BK McD's Wendy's KFC (Taco Bell's in Green Brook and Pizza Hut's in Somerville)/Bridgewater Diner which is alrite not as good as Time To Eat in the S. circle where the service is top notch/Fuddruckers where you can get a great Buffalo Burger and chocolate shake/Red Lobster and Houlihans two places that aren't that impressive to me but you might dig them/Lone Star Steakhouse which isn't all that great either/Best Buy and Home Goods/Bed Bath Beyond and Michaels Craft Store/Very kind police who really seem to give a damn about the town/a nice baseball field/a nice library/Chimney Rock Inn which I still can't locate but I hear they have a good bar pie/Lexus Dealership which can be a perfect motivator when you pass it on 22 to move on up haha/The Office never been there but I hear they are decent with their food/Maggiano's Little Italy and Chipolte good food though I prefer authentic Italian and Mexican eateries rather than chains/Marriott and a nice glass office building next door with a very pleasant water blast outside/and the benefit of close access to Somerville train station so you can get to NYC (to be fair, Green Brook has good access to both that and Dunellen train station). When you drive on 22 make sure you keep your anger in check because I can tell you right now there will be some driver every time you go on it who is either going too slow or too fast or doesn't put on turn signals or cut you off and so on it's just a fact of life. The Somerville Circle is the SCARIEST piece of road this side of GSP south in the summer months. Only this contraption is scary all four seasons and every single minute. I would recommend avoiding it but if you must use it hold your breath and cross your fingers and hope all the traffic will work in harmony. Bridgewater has a beautiful Hindi temple and some chic shops like Croft and Barrell, Bloomingdales, and everyone's fave Starbucks. Overall, Bridgewater would get my vote for best town to move into of the three, just be prepared for dreadful driving in the area and of course have a good job to continue affording to live there!

[ADDBrophy]

To end my replies, I would say Hillsborough is the least of the three picks IMHO. Still, I won't hate it on it; the atmosphere is nice, there's not too much of a snotty aura there; you have a Famous Daves/IHOP/Applebees and also a rather trashy Kmart that's redeemed by the fact there's Wal-Mart and Target nearby in B-Water and Manville; a very good high school that doesn't have any less of a liquid heroin problem than the two Hunterdon schools or BR or WH regional (I must say liquid heroin is terrible and it's a shame that it's the current drug of choice); and Hillsborough has a more peaceful, laid back feeling to it than the more rushed B-Water and always moving Green Brook. However, because it can get rather dull there and it's selection of goods services and recreation isn't as good as the others I'm gonna have to put this last on the list. BTW I rarely see Hillsborough police around which is a negative on my list and I have already pointed out Green Brook and Bridgewater have better law enforcement. Still, I'd take Hillsborough over Raritan/Somerville/Bound Brook any day!

[ADDBrophy]

Branchburg is a cool town. The police can kind of be annoying in that they seem to enjoy pulling people over on things they don't really need to pull you over for like going through a yellow at the last second or doing an illegal U-Turn with nobody around (not to mention pull you over on that 25 mph part of the road leading into Raritan), but other than that I can't think of any other negatives. Of course route 22 is a headache at all hours and I recommend keeping your anger in check if there's ever a bad driver around or else you'll be feeling that anger every single day. BTW Last American Diner and the green painted hot dog place with a name that escapes me are worth trying! Sundaes has good ice cream too.

[chrismaya]

Can't go wrong with any of them!